All parties involved in last week’s disputed Guild elections at KIU Main Campus that saw Laureate Atukunzire declared Guild President-Elect has been summoned to attend a joint meeting with the University’s top management and administration at 2 pm today Tuesday 19th April 2022.
In letters dated 13th April 2022 and addressed to individual candidates and their nominators, the office of the dean of students clearly states that the reason behind the summon is to address the prevailing standoff in relation to the recently carried out guild elections. She urges all stakeholders to take the matter with utmost seriousness
After declaring Atunkunzire as Guild president-elect on Monday 11th April 13, 2022, her opponent’s camp stormed the Electoral commission chairman’s desk in disagreement preventing her from signing the declaration forms which they later confiscated.
Moses Ebye and his nominators say that Monday’s election was not free, fair and transparent. They accuse the chairman’s electoral commission of enacting his own laws and procedures which were not compatible with provisions in the Guild Union constitution.
Apart from declaring Laureate Atukunzire as president-elect without considering the voice of the voters, Ebye’s camp had earlier before the Election Day expressed their worry over the conduct of the electoral commission in a letter dated 9th April 13, 2022, citing a number of irregularities among which they alleged that Atukunzire never had the required number of 13 seconders and that she had not paid the same nomination fee as Ebye.
The letter also stresses that the affected party, Moses Ebye was dissatisfied and discontented with what he described as ‘’maladministration tendencies’’ within the electoral commission that he could not assimilate with.
According to Ebye, the electoral commission did not respond to their letter and queries but went on to organize the election which he said made it even worse by announcing an ‘’unlawful candidate’’.
In contrast, the chairperson of the Guild Union electoral commission, Solomon Oketcho said on Tuesday that the election was free and fair and that the commotion created by Ebye and his team after he declared Laureate as president-elect was a security matter.
‘’In any election, you expect such events like what happened yesterday but those are minor issues that are addressed by security,’’ Oketcho said
However, all efforts to capture Atukunzire’s views on the matter at hand have proved futile though some of her nominators we have talked to maintain that their candidate is in a good position to win the contest.
